The 638-horsepower LS9 from Chevrolet’s new Corvette ZR1 is the most powerful engine GM has ever made. The 1969 Camaro is (arguably) the most beautiful car GM has ever made. Combine the two, and you have a match made in heaven known (lovingly) as Jackass.
Made by Mark Stielow, the Jackass Camaro not only features the engine from the ZR1, but the GIGANTIC carbon-ceramic brakes as well.
Rounding out the package is a Tremec T56 six-speed out of a Viper, and an Art Morrison subframe to hold it all together.
In all, Mark says that it would have been “cheaper to just buy a ZR1”, but then you wouldn’t have the baddest car on the block.
[Via: Inside Line]
Formula DRIFT kicked off the 2009 season last Saturday, and with a new race format and new rules designed to increase the number of rounds during the main event, there was plenty of action on the streets of Long Beach. In the end, last year’s champion Tanner Foust edged out Robbie Nishida for third place, and after a close final, Ryan Tuerck took home his first win of the season over Samuel Hubinette.
Cars that made their debut at the event include Tanner Foust’s new NASCAR V8 powered Scion tC, Vaughn Gittin Jr.’s new 2010 Mustang GT, and Rhys Millen’s new Hyundai Genesis Coupe. Absent from the competition was Samuel Hubinette’s new Dodge Challenger, though the team did tease it from the trailer, and it looked like it will be ready for battle soon.
Not surprisingly, Long Beach was home to a few spectacular crashes, including Ken Gushi’s slide into the wall on Friday that knocked him out of the competition, and Tommy Suell and Katsuhiro Ueo’s crash during qualifying that crushed the left side of Tommy’s AE86 and prevented him from competing. On Saturday, Conrad Grunewald smacked his Corvette into the tire wall after following Ryan Tuerck too wide into turn 10, Calvin Wan hit the wall in a solo crash while battling Ryan Tuerck, and Vaughn Gitten Jr. and Samuel Hubinette tangled heading into the final turn, leaving Gitten’s Mustang with a bit of a nose job and Hubinette’s Viper with a crumpled rim.
Formula DRIFT now heads to Road Atlanta for Round 2 on May 8th and 9th, and judging by what was seen at Long Beach, the 2009 season is going to be a good one.
(Also be sure to check out the full gallery at my Flickr page.)
[Flickr - Formula DRIFT, Long Beach]
[Formula DRIFT]
Though I doubt a cobra and a viper have ever come together to mate in nature, the result of this unholy matrimony looks pretty darn good to me!
Called the “Sniper”, it’s a 1994 SVT Cobra Mustang that now has the heart and soul of a V10 Viper engine transplanted within, and twin-turbos on top of the whole thing because apparently, 500 horses just isn’t enough.
To fit the monster mill into the engine bay of the ‘stang, CobraScott (his TheTurboForums nickname) moved the firewall back 10 inches, built a custom k-member, custom trans mount, and added a 10-point cage to the inside for safety. (Basically a must-have when your car is making more horsepower than a train!)
Scott also added twin T-76 turbos, Alcon brakes, coilover suspension and Forgeline wheels to round out the package, though I wonder if he’ll need anything more than a gas pedal, a seatbelt and a smile.
The project isn’t finished just yet, but it’s coming along nicely, so I wouldn’t be surprised to see this sniper picking off adversaries on the streets in no time.
[TheTurboForums - Sniper]
[Via: Mustang News]
If you’re still using a Polaroid camera to capture life on film, then be sure to snap a shot of the next Dodge Viper that you see, because both are soon going to be gone.
Polaroid has confirmed that they will no longer produce instant film after this year, and it’s rumored that Dodge will no longer be making the Viper after 2011, which means that the loss of a quirky technology and a venomous supercar come as a one two punch.
All is not lost however, as old Polaroid cameras can turn into quite the clever webcam, and the Viper’s demise hopefully means that Dodge has another supercar in the works, but the news definitely puts a damper on my dreams of Viper ownership. (The Viper was the car that got me excited about cars in the first place.)
Excuse me now while I mourn.
[Polaroid Webcam]
[Polaroid]
[Dodge - Viper]
[Polaroid Via: The New York Times]
[Viper Via: Jalopnik]
